اتاق خواب

Chapter five

The Bedroom

Vincent van Gogh painted The Bedroom in 1888. Kara knew this because she had written about a painting for a school project. Kara’s teacher Mr Haulet had asked a class to write about a picture that meant something special to them. Kara had fallen in love with The Bedroom when a moment she first saw it a book at school.

It was a very simple picture of the artist’s bedroom in the Yellow House in a town called Arles in France. The Bedroom in the painting was a strange shape. One of the things Kara liked about a painting was the colours.

The walls and doors were pail blue, the wooden bed and the chairs were partly yellow and the windows were green. The colours made Kara thing of the sun. She could see herself in the room looking out of the windows onto the streets over sleepy French town. She had always wanted the bedroom like the one in the bedroom.

‘How strange,’ she thought, ‘the find my favourite picture here.’ Suddenly, Martin run into the room and jumped onto the bed.

‘Come on Kara, it’s time to go and meet the spy!’ he shouted.

‘You can’t come with me,’ she replied. ‘He said I have to go alone.’

‘Hey,’ said Martin, looking upset. ‘How do you know the spy is a he? Anyway I’m not going to let you go in your own. I’m coming and that’s final.’

So Kara and Martin left their house together. They crossed the courtyard and walked pass the cottages to the barn behind the bushes. The barn was old and looked as it might fall down in any moment. Kara walked in first, followed by Martin.

She had expected the barn to be empty but it was full of old furniture, paintings, boxes, broken computers and a hundred other strange things.

‘This place is amazing,’ Martin said, sitting down on an old blue armchair.

‘What time is it?’ asked Kara.

Martin looked across at an old clock in the corner. ‘Ten past five,’ he said. ‘The spy is late.’

They waited until half past five but nobody came. Kara felt disappointed. She had been excited at the idea of finding a new friend. Martin, however, seemed happy.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s go back.’

Martin started walking back towards the house. Kara waited until he had left and then looked around the barn one last time. ‘Hello? Are you here?’ she called, hoping the person was hiding in the shadows. But there was no answer. All she could hear was the sound of the clock.

As she followed Martin back to the house it started to rain lightly. Kara looked up and saw dark clouds in the sky above her so she started walking more quickly down the path. As she passed the cottages, she thought she saw a curtain move inside one of the windows. She thought about knocking on the cottage door but now the rain was falling more heavily so she went on back to the house.

When she got back, Mum was in the kitchen preparing dinner. There was no sign of Howard. Kara was glad.

‘Mum?’ she asked. ‘Are there other people staying here? I mean, in the other buildings?’

‘I don’t know,’ replied Mum. ‘I don’t think so. Howard didn’t say anything.’

‘Howard? Why would he know?’ Kara asked.

Her mother’s face went a little red. ‘He lives up the road,’ she said, ‘so he knows who comes and who goes.’

‘Have you met him before?’ Kara asked.

‘Howard? No, of course not,’ Mum answered quickly. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘No reason,’ Kara replied. ‘I was just curious.’

There was something strange about Howard and about the way Mum acted when she was with him. When they had been lost in the car, Mum seemed to relax when Howard had told her his name. There had also been something strange about the way Mum had looked at him in the gym. Had they met before? Or was she attracted to him? Kara hoped not. She hoped her mother was not in love with Howard. The idea made her feel ill.

‘How long until dinner, Mum?’ Kara asked.

‘Five minutes,’ replied her mother.

So Kara went to look for Martin. She found him in the games room.

‘This is cool,’ Martin said. He was throwing darts at a dartboard.

A large pool table dominated the room. Apart from the pool table, there was a small round table, the dartboard, and a big bookcase full of books and board games.

‘Do you want to play?’ Martin asked as he walked to the dartboard and pulled out the darts he had just thrown. Kara shook her head.

‘I’ve been thinking,’ Martin said, ‘about the spy. I think I need to teach him something.’

‘Teach him?’ said Kara.

She watched Martin throw more darts at the dartboard.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I want to teach him that it’s bad to spy on other people,’ Martin replied. ‘After dinner I’m going to go spy hunting. Do you want to come?’

‘No, I don’t,’ she said. ‘You won’t hurt him, will you?’

‘Bulls eye!’ Martin shouted as a dart hit the very centre of the dartboard.

After dinner, while Martin was spy hunting, Kara turned on the laptop and wrote a message to her mystery ‘friend’.

Please be careful, she wrote. Martin is looking for you.

She pressed send and quickly received a reply.

Thanks for the warning, read the message.

Who are you? Kara wrote back. Why didn’t you come to the barn?

There was a pause. Then the reply came.

I told you before. I’m a friend. I went to the barn but you weren’t alone. I heard you talking to someone. I asked you to come alone.

I was with Martin. He’s my brother, Kara typed.

Pause.

I have to see you alone, the message came back. How about tomorrow morning, at eight o’clock?

I’ll be there, Kara wrote.

And the message came back: I must go now.

Then Kara typed quickly. Wait! Tell me your name.

Pause.

Kara waited for an answer but none came. Had Martin found her ‘friend’? What had happened?

Later, when Kara finally heard her brother’s footsteps coming along the corridor, she opened the door and called out to him. ‘Martin! What happened?’

Martin turned and looked back at her. His face and hair were wet from the rain.

‘Did you find him?’ Kara asked.

Martin smiled. ‘He managed to escape,’ he said. ‘Someone must have warned him.’

‘It wasn’t me,’ Kara replied, too quickly.

Kara watched as the smile disappeared from Martin’s face. She felt uncomfortable because she had lied to her brother and he knew she had lied. What was happening? She had never lied to him before.

Martin waited for Kara to say something but she was silent. Then Martin turned and walked to his room.

‘Goodnight, Kara,’ he said, closing his bedroom door behind him.